The Rise of Realism by Manuel DeLanda Graham Harman & Graham Harman

Author:Manuel DeLanda,Graham Harman & Graham Harman [DeLanda, Manuel & Harman, Graham]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Published: 2017-06-05T00:00:00+00:00

DeLanda: Of course, but I am not saying that the sum total of all possible relations is part of the identity of an object, since that sum total would be made mostly out of trivial variations. Hence the need for an additional concept to distinguish historical events that are special from the majority of events that are ordinary and unremarkable. But you are correct to point out that for this to work, the significance (or lack thereof) of an event cannot be “significance for us.” Certain cosmic events, such as the bifurcations that transformed the single super-symmetric force that existed after the Big Bang into four distinct forces (gravity, electro-magnetism, and the two nuclear forces) were significant relative to the present state of the universe, with discrete planets and stars, since the latter would not exist had the forces not become differentiated. And similarly for evolutionary events: the meteorite that crashed on our planet, sending most large reptiles into extinction, was significant because it opened up ecological niches for the few undifferentiated mammals that existed at the time, allowing for an intense differentiation of mammalian species (kept discrete and separate by reproductive isolation). Now, if we assume for the moment that these events actually happened (there is evidence for them but not enough to compel assent) they were significant regardless of the fact that human beings did not find out about them until the twentieth century.

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